§ Order for Committee read.
§ Motion made and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
SIR FREDERIC SMITHasked the Under Secretary of State for War, Whether any steps had been taken towards forming a central depôt for the War Department stores; and, if so, whether any manufacturing operations were to be carried on there? He trusted that the project which they had heard so much of last year of forming a depôt in the centre of the country would not be carried into effect. If there was to be a new depôt at all it ought to be somewhere on the coast, where it would be easy of access for shipping. He also wished to know whether the invaliding establishments and medical school were to be removed from Chatham to Netley. The latter place, he understood, was in a state of forwardness, and fit to receive the invalids. He likewise wanted some information as to the state of progress of the for- 725 tifications authorized to be undertaken in consequence of the recommendations of the Defence Commissioners, and for which Parliament granted in August last the sum of £1,650,000; whether it had been determined not to proceed with some of the works then stated to be necessary; and if so, which of them were to be postponed or abandoned? He also wished to know whether it was the intention to lay on the table of the House a detailed estimate, according to the usual practice, of the probable cost of each work intended to be constructed; and, whether the projects and plans for these works, or any and which of them, had been definitely settled and approved; and what contracts, if any, had been entered into for their execution? His reason for asking those questions was that the House might fairly and deliberately consider whether they should expend £10,000,000 or £12,000,000 in this way on works many of which he believed would be useless or worse than useless. He trusted the works on Portsdown Hill would not be carried out according to the plan of last year, for if they were, and those on Hilsea were carried out also, the one or the other would be quite superfluous. Two lines of defence, both of such power and extent, could not be necessary within two miles of each other. The Portsdown lines, as proposed, would extend to seven miles, and how could they defend seven miles of works? The whole available troops they would have would not be sufficient for the defence of the entire circuit of works now proposed for the security of Portsmouth and which would be of almost equal extent with the lines of Torres Vedras. The proposition was perfectly monstrous. He had no objection to a small sum of money for sea defences; but fresh views had arisen with regard to sea defences, for if it should turn out that iron-cased vessels were invulnerable, how could we prevent a fleet from occupying the Solent and thence destroying Portsmouth Dockyard? But we were going on with our defensive works and ship-building in total ignorance of what shot-proof really is. Nothing could be more remarkble than the various qualities of iron. The resisting power of some iron was so much greater than that of inferior qualities, that by using the superior quality nearly one-fourth of the thickness might be dispensed with; if that were true, ships would probably be enabled to carry their armour; but if it were neces- 726 sary to have the iron six or seven inches thick, they would not be able to do so without seriously diminishing their seagoing qualities. Were they prepared to say that the iron put on these ships should be four inches and a half thick, and that they would be shot-proof? If that was not so, the money expended in their construction would be thrown away. The first question they had to decide was, what would give the proper resistance? "When they had ascertained that, they would be in a position to make contracts. They had known for five years that ships of this kind would have to be constructed, and some one was to blame for being so long inactive in this matter. It was said that the works on Portsdown Hill were to protect Portsmouth against an enemy who might otherwise erect batteries for bombardment at the distance of 8,000 yards, and at the same time we were told of artillery that would have a range of 12,000 yards. Should the longer range be obtained the construction of a costly chain of works, which give security only against the shorter range, was a manifest absurdity and waste of money. He entreated the Government not to proceed with the works in the meantime. There was time enough. He also hoped the commercial harbours would not be neglected. They were of more importance than they were apparently considered at the War Office. He should be obliged if his hon. Friend would be kind enough to answer the questions he had put to him.
DICKSONrose to move, as an Amendment to the Motion that the House do now go into Committee of Supply, that the Army Estimates be deferred with a view to their revision. He repudiated all idea of casting blame on Her Majesty's Government; but the more minutely he inspected the Army Estimates and pondered over the discrepancies he discovered in them, the more impossible it appeared to come to any real reductions without submitting them to a thorough revision. He did not wish to reduce the effective strength of the army by a single man, or in any way to weaken that watchfulness which they were bound to exercise over the safety of the country; but when he found that the Military Estimates had increased within the last seven years at the rate of £1,000,000 per annum—when he found that the expenditure which seven years ago was only £9,000,000, with the number of troops at 119,000, was this year £14,000,000, with 146,000 troops—when 727 he found that the average expense per man, which at the former period was £75, had been increased to £100 per man, without any material improvement in the condition of the working portion of the army—when he found, in short, that the Estimates were not £14,000,000, but, as he should show, nearly £16,000,000—he thought it was time to consider in what position they stood. In order to discover how this augmentation had arisen he would look at some of the items apart. For the Medical Staff alone there was an increase of nearly £10,000 over last year's estimate. In Ceylon, where we had only one regiment of infantry, and a small battalion of artillery, there was a deputy inspector of hospitals with four staff surgeons, eight assistant surgeons, one dispenser, one purvoyor with his staff, at an expense of £3,500 a year. The medical establishment on the west coast of Africa cost £5,000; in Australia, £3,000; in Bermuda, £6,000; Canada, £3,500; Cape of Good Hope, though a very healthy climate, £9,000; Malta, £3,500, and so on at other places, the whole amount being £63,500 for the Medical Staff alone. At this moment we were keeping up in our colonies a force of 48,500 men, forming thirty-four battalions of infantry, with artillery, and this was exclusive of such corps as the West Indian contingent. The presence of our troops in all those places was not necessary, and it was not desirable to keep them in such unhealthy climates. The amount charged for pay alone to the troops in the colonies was £240,000. He would especially notice the enormous increase in the staff of the War Office and of the Horse Guards. The expense of clerks employed in the War Office alone now amounted to no less than £117,000; whereas in the year 1853–4, when we were just about commencing the Russian war, the cost of the War Office and Ordnance for clerks and bookkeepers was £37,361. At the Horse Guards, in three offices, that of the Adjutant General, the Quartermaster General, and another, the expense had increased from £9,000 to £16,000. In 1853–4 the expense of the clerks in the War Office and the Ordnance Office was £30,261, while this year the cost of the War Office clerks alone was £117,845. Yet in some branches of the effective service there had been a reduction of strength; we had not the same number of men in the cavalry or in the Horse Artillery as we formerly had, and the 728 same might be said of the Military Train, which he did not much esteem. Then, again, with respect to barracks, buildings, and fortifications, there were, he thought, great opportunities for reduction. There were many barracks which wore not occupied—as, for instance, at Newport and Brecon—and one of the main arguments in favour of what he must call an absurd scheme of fortifications, for which the House voted £12,000,000, was that those fortifications would afford great accommodation for troops. Without travelling through all the items, he would impress upon the House that if they desired to effect savings they must commence by making reductions in small items which had been recently added, and which were constantly increasing in amount, without contributing proportionately to the advantage of the country. The proposed staff for the depôt battalions was out of all proportion. Upon the Vote for depôt battalions he found credit taken for 14 lieutenant-colonels, 20 majors, 16 adjutants, 16 paymasters, 3 surgeon-majors, 13 surgeons, and 28 assistant-surgeons. He thought the number of surgeons was out of proportion to the lieutenant-colonels; nor could he understand why, if a major was fit to command a depôt in one place, a lieutenant-colonel should be necessary in another. Then, again, he found there was a General officer commanding the brigade of Guards, which caused an expense of £1,300 a year. He did not at all question the claim of Lord Rokeby to any distinction or favour that the Crown could bestow, nor did he quarrel with the privileges of the Guards, but he could not understand why a major-general was necessary for them when he was not needed for a like number of regiments of the Line. There was also a new appointment of pré cis writer to the War Office, with a salary of £1,000 a year, and also an additional inspector of fortifications. Altogether, the expenses of the War Office and of the Commander-in-Chief exceeded £200,000—an enormous increase upon last year's amount. There was also an item of £108,000 for fortifications, which he could not understand after the Vote of £12,000,000 last year. He thought the increase from £12,000 to £20,000 for experiments was too much. The charge for forage was put down at £502,000—a large sum, which made it surprising that an act of justice should have been refused to cavalry officers on account of tenderness for the British rate- 729 payer. The charge for building barracks needed explanation, as the cost varied greatly in the cases of Portsmouth, Gosport, and Dover. The expense of maintaining the camp at Aldershot was very large, and he must take the opportunity of observing that he did not recognize the advantage of keeping a permanent camp; but he was sure that it was a hardship upon men who had spent many years in the colonies to be required to pass a large portion of the time they were allowed to remain in England in a large camp, away from all the comforts and conveniences which they expected to enjoy at home. At all events, if the camp was to be maintained, he thought the Staff should be changed yearly, so that all officers might learn the art of handling large masses of troops. He found the cost of Netley Hospital was to be £400,000 for about 1,000 patients, and he thought it was well worthy of consideration whether the same accommodation could not be obtained for a much less expense. The increase for hospital diet was £45,000 upon the sum taken last year, which was itself an increase of £50,000 upon the preceding year. There was a charge of £3,000 for religious books, the same amount as last year. He should wish to add to the comfort, physical, moral, and spiritual, of the soldier; but he believed some limit might be found to the sums expended on these items. The whole of the library establishment would bear some reduction of expense. These points were well worth the consideration of the House. He did not impute any blame to the Government; the Estimates were, perhaps, not more extravagant than it had, unfortunately, been the custom of the House of Commons to grant: but he thought they ought to have a larger force for the amount they at present paid; and that force ought to be as well or better clothed, better fed, and better taken care of for the amount of money spent. But he did not suppose they could at that moment go largely into a discussion of the items on which he thought a reduction might be made; that was rather a matter for the Committee. But, whatever was the fate of his Motion, it would have given hon. Members an opportunity of discussing the whole subject. He did not presume to lecture the House, and he had not gone into those criticisms which some Members had not thought it unworthy of thorn to make before their constituents and the country; but he hoped the House 730 would consider the subject seriously, for the country looked to them for a diminution of that expenditure of which it was sick and weary. He contended that the Estimates were not prepared with due economy, for they were periodically tainted with meddlesome parsimony or profuse extravagance, and he trusted that the House would agree with him that these Estimates should be amply and fully revised.
§
Amendment proposed,
To leave out from the word 'That' to the end of the Question, in order to add the words 'the Consideration of the Army Estimates he deferred, with a view to their revision,'"—instead thereof.
MR. T. G. BARINGthought the hon. and gallant Member had not stated sufficient grounds for postponing the Estimates. On the contrary, he had shown that every point he had mooted might be discussed—and better discussed—in Committee. The gallant Officer stated that these Estimates, instead of amounting to £14,000,000, were really £16,000,000. But he did not clearly show on what he founded this statement. The gallant Officer had alluded to many points into which he hoped the House would excuse him from entering, for the reason he had stated. He had alluded to the colonial military expenditure; at the present moment a Committee of the House was engaged in inquiring into that subject, and that inquiry could not but be of great advantage to the Government. With respect to the expenditure upon the medical staff and Hospitals, it was certainly increased; but the House should recollect it was occasioned by the improvements that had been effected in them. It was the same with respect to the expenditure on barracks. It was in order to give better accommodation to the soldiers, and to provide quarters for those who were married. With regard to the expense of fortifications, he would recall to the recollection of the gallant Officer that the House had not sanctioned an expenditure of £12,000,000, as he seemed to believe. The total estimate of the new works for the construction of which the Government had the power to raise a loan was £5,000,000; and the reason why a sum for fortifications appeared in the present Estimates was, that the Government was strictly bound to spend the money to be raised only on the places specified in schedule A of the Act. The gallant Officer himself anticipated that the House would go into Committee on the 731 Estimates, and in Committee he should be happy to give any further explanation when the particular Votes came under consideration.
COLONEL DUNNEbelieved that the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Baring), like most officials, preferred going into Committee to giving an answer to the objections that had been made to these Estimates. But the objections did not proceed from the "peace-at-any-price" party, or from any one who had the slightest hostility to the establishments of the country; they were made by professional men and men who had been connected with the War Department itself. All that they desired was to see that the money granted was spent with economy, and to have it shown that it was spent as it ought to be—for the efficiency of the service. In order to know and to judge that it was so, the House must get information, and the hon. Gentleman did not seem disposed to afford information. On a former evening, when he (Colonel Dunne) moved for a specified Return of the expenditure on arms and accoutrements, the hon. Gentleman's reply was that the Return if given would have been so voluminous and contain such numerous details as not to be able to pass through the door of the House. Such Returns were not unprecedented, and all the information he asked had been frequently given in different Returns, and it was but a short time before that the hon. Member for Manchester (Mr. Turner) moved for a Return of the prices paid for all articles provided to the War Department under contracts, and it was granted by the noble Lord (Lord Herbert) the Secretary at War. That Return was much more voluminous than the one he had asked for; it contained 12,000 or 14,000 items. His Return would not have required a thirtieth or fortieth part of that number. The answer of the hon. Gentleman, therefore, was no sufficient excuse for not granting it. From the want of information, hon. Members were not prepared to consider the Estimates, because the hon. Gentleman did not choose to give the Returns the House was bound to have. Since the Ordnance Department had been united to the War Office, the House had less information than before; less was communicated in the present united Estimate than had been given in those presented separately from each, and yet complaints were even made that they were not sufficiently explanatory. In the Return of arms obtained since 1852–3, 732 what he asked for was a Return of the contracts for arms, of the prices paid to contractors and the quantity supplied by them, of the quantities made in our manufactories, of what each kind of arms cost, what was the entire quantity of arms obtained, and to what services they were issued, what quantity remained in store, in fact how they were disposed of? Every one knew that the catalogue of the arms of the British forces was a small one; and, considering the immense sums that had been voted for them in a short period, the House had a right to know what had become of them. The amount expended on small arms—if any hon. Member looked into the Estimates—would be found to be since 1856 nearly £3,000,000; and taking the expenditure on the Enfield establishment and other expenditure into account, the sum spent on arms since the two departments were amalgamated was between £4,000,000 and £5,000,000. Reckoning the cost of a rifle at £3 10s., or even £4, we ought with this outlay to have had 1,000,000 stand of arms, and the House had a right to know where these arms were or what had been done with the money. Then, the detailed Returns furnished with regard to clothing rendered it impossible at this moment to make out what a soldier's dress cost the country, or to judge whether our army was now clothed at the cheapest rate. There was every reason to believe it was not so, in fact he knew that it had been said that it cost the country 40 per cent more than formerly, and allowing it to have been improved this was too much; and the clothing branch of the War Department always evaded giving information if even it possessed it. Then with regard to the cavalry horses, the Vote of £57,466 asked for seemed most extravagant; a cavalry horse, according to the evidence given before the Military Committee, ought to last with care eight to ten years. The number of cavalry was 13,642, and they had been voting money year after year for the purchase of horses to such an amount as would give them 20,000, which was more than they possessed of cavalry by about five thousand. Last year the estimate for horses for the service of the country was £105,030; and this sum, supposing each horse to cost, on an average £40, which was much more than it did, would supply 26,215 horses; in the year 1859– 60, the estimate was £75,830, and the present is £59,466. 733 The hon. Gentleman should inform the House what had become of all these horses or at least how the sum voted for them was applied. He believed that the fast drill of the cavalry had been carried to an absurdity, and had been the cause of using up the horses very quickly. And so with regard to the movements of troops, the same extravagance was perceptible, for while we had been concentrating our forces by building new barracks and by the establishment at Aldershot, on which much more than £1,000,000 had been spent, as well as at the Curragh, the cost of moving the troops had gone on largely increasing. In 1856 it was £36,000, and this year it was £110,000. The expenditure on shot and shell was also enormously increased. This could, to a large extent, be accounted for by the introduction of new and improved projectiles, and by the expenditure in the Chinese war. The expenditure also of these stores in experiments were also increased; but at the same time the hon. Gentleman was bound to show the House what shot and shell, and other projectiles had been obtained for the large sums voted, what amount had been expended in the services of the country and what remained for the future. Altogether, he hoped the House would not agree to the Estimates until the Under Secretary for War promised Returns, which could be easily furnished, and which would enable the House to judge whether the money voted by it was applied with advantage to the public service.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, he was glad that the subject of the Army Estimates had been taken up by his hon. and gallant Friend, for, with his experience, anything coming from him would be worthy of the consideration of the House. It was a pity that he was not in the House at the time the great Aldershot job was perpetrated. The country ought to be warned that the money of the country had been wasted there for a purpose of very doubtful utility. Aldershot was nothing but an indifferent preparatory school for forming indifferent generals. Everyman connected with the army knew that it was a most demoralizing place for the troops. ["Hear."] His hon. Friend who cheered had been there and would probably give them his experience of this most demoralizing school. Was the system to be continued? Upwards of £1,500,000 had been flung away on the cavalry barracks, the riding schools, the stables, and a kind of palace at Alder- 734 shot. If any good came of it one would not so much complain, but every commanding officer he had seen held up his hands and said, "So long as the House of Commons can be induced to vote these sums so long will these monstrous jobs be perpetrated." Now, "job" was an awkward word, but he could apply no other term to an expenditure so enormous, incurred with the problematical view of making indifferent brigadiers. With regard to the Motion before the House, he thought his hon. and gallant Friend would act wisely in not pressing it, because if a case for reduction could be made out, he believed that the present temper of the House was such that the Vote might be revised in Committee. But the attention of the Under Secretary for War should be directed to another point. Last year the House, in one of the panics which he deplored, was hurried into a Vote of £11,000,000 for the defences of the country, and they were told it was of such moment that they were hardly allowed time to debate it. From that day to this, however, no satisfactory account had been given of the mode in which this money was to be spent. It was reported, however, that many of the works at first proposed were not to be built, and other plans wore being altered. On Portsmouth alone £2,800,000 was to be spent, and they were told that the lines of Portsdown Hill were to be made like those of Torres Vedras. But the lines of Torres Vedras were formed on rock, which it was impossible to mine under, while Portsdown Hill was of chalk. Now, he supposed those fortifications were to be constructed with a view to the possibility that an enemy might sit down before them; but no subsoil was so favourable to mining operations as chalk, since no galleries and no supports were necessary. That point was overlooked, however, in planning these fortifications. It was proposed that there should be nine distinct forts, exclusive of the lines flanking them at each end, and that 226 guns should be mounted there, requiring 2,260 artillerymen to man them. On all these points the hon. Gentleman was bound to give some explicit and detailed statement as to what the Government were doing. Upon the authority of many engineering officers he believed them to be unnecessary. At a recent meeting of the Naval Architect's Society, at which the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Droitwich (Sir John Pakington) presided, 735 it came out that the building the four forts at the entrance was not considered sufficient unless they were plated with iron. That was stated on the authority of Admiral Elliot, and his statement had not been since controverted. Moreover, a most able pamphlet had been written on this subject by a gallant officer to prove that these forts were of no use at all, and would only serve as beacons for an enemy coming in. He had heard with satisfaction the observations of the Chancellor of the Exchequer the other evening about the increasing expenditure of the country, and in the face of that lecture he did entreat the House to pause about this gigantic scheme, involving such a gigantic expense. Let Aldershot be a warning before their eyes; let them not go and plunge into this enormous expense for erecting nine distinct forts on Portsdown Hill; and he implored the Government not to hurry the House into voting these sums, probably to be raised in the most objectionable manner—by a loan; for it was only because it was thought that the burden could be shuffled off on posterity that the House had consented to do what had already been done. These were times when it behoved the Chancellor of the Exchequer not merely to lecture the House on excess of expenditure, but to rise in his place, when these particular votes were proposed, and declare his opinion of them. There was very good reason to suppose that both the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the President of the Board of Trade were altogether opposed to the Fortification Vote, but when the little band of some twenty-five voted against it the Chancellor of the Exchequer absented himself. He hoped when the Under Secretary for War rose to reply to this Motion he would go into details as to how this large sum was to be expended at Portsdown Hill. He (Mr. Bernal Osborne) believed we ought not to go on with these forts at all—they were entirely in the hands of one man, who was not at the head of his profession. He knew that engineers differed most materially on this point, and the House ought to pause before they agreed to these most objectionable fortifications. He hoped, however, that the hon. and gallant Member would not now press his Motion, but urge his objections as particular Votes came on.
COLONEL NORTHobserved that much had been said in disparagement of Aldershot, but it was notorious that the army had been much benefited by the encamp- 736 ment at Chobham previous to the Russian war. He certainly could not understand why Aldershot should only produce indifferent brigadier officers, for he thought that officers of that class in the British Army had done their duty as well as the General Officers in any other army.
GENERAL LINDSAYmaintained that no military man could be at Aldershot watching the operations or taking part in them without adding to his stock of professional information. He did not think it fair for the hon. Member to say that Aldershot produced only indifferent brigadiers. The gallant officer who formerly commanded the camp, and with whom he had served upon six different occasions, was a man of the greatest ability, and the brigadiers who served under him understood their work well. He did not think it fair to mix up with the officers at the head of the camp the jobbery which the hon. Member represented to have taken place at a former period. He did not mean to say that the camp had been formed with foresight; and, no doubt, large sums which had been spent might have been distributed with greater economy, and secured the same results at a cheaper rate; but he could not hear, without contradicting the assertion, that Aldershot was of no use to the army.
COLONEL GILPINsaid, that before the camp at Aldershot was formed the Government were urged night after night to get some place where large bodies of troops might be massed together, and at Aldershot they had a large quantity of ground very varied in character; indeed, if they had searched England through he did not think they could have acquired a better position. He could speak with reference to the new barracks, for he had occupied them. Whether or not they were built on the most economical principles he could not say, but they were admirably constructed; the barracks for the men were better than those for the officers, and the health of the troops there would compare favourably with the sanitary state of those at other military stations throughout the country. One fault of position was that they had been built at the edge of the Government land, and in consequence fresh land had to be purchased at a high price. He believed the encampment had been most useful to General Officers and others. As to the necessity of fortifying Portsdown Hill, no man could go to the top of it without seeing that with the new system of gunnery it would be easy to send 737 shot from it into the midst of the fortifications of Portsmouth.
§ MR. MONSELLsaid, he did not desire to prolong the discussion, but he wished to revert to the question whether consistently with the efficiency of the army it was possible to save any large sum on these Estimates. He would, in passing, remark that the speech of the Chancellor of the Exchequer the other evening was generally cheered, and particularly from these (the Liberal) benches; but now when the question of economy came before them in a practical shape some Members of the party absented themselves from the House. In these long columns of Estimates the difficulty of pointing out whether extravagance existed was considerable, and he, therefore, proposed to quote a few leading items in 1853–54 and compare them with the same items in the present Estimates, taking into account the number of men voted. In 1853–54 the number of men belonging to the army and scientific corps was 119,881; and in the present year the number was 146,045. "What was the difference of the expense of the Staff? For the 119,881 men the expense of the Staff was £175,895, and the expense of the Staff now was £326,898. The House would see at once the enormous disproportion between the increase in the number of men and the increase in the expense of the Staff. On that point the House had a right to expect from the Government a full and complete explanation. The next point he would refer to was the article of forage. In 1853–54 the army had 9,450 horses, and in the present year the number was 13,642. In 1853 the expense of forage—oats and hay—was very much the same as in the present year, but the difference in the cost of the forage in the two periods was a follows:—In 1853–54 the cost was £269,165, and in the present year £482,392. He would next refer to the articles of fuel and light. He thought the House had some right to expect a reduction in these items, for they had been told that the introduction of gas and cooking stores would lessen the expense; but in the year 1853–54 the charge for fuel and light had been £116,220, while in the present year it amounted to £241,157. The expenditure for the purchase and repair of barrack and hospital furniture had in the former year been £57,829; this year it was £127,400, and so on with many other articles with which he would not weary the House. That being so, he 738 thought he had clearly demonstrated to every hon. Gentleman who listened to him that a most disproportionate increase had, in the charge under every one of those heads, taken place. Taking next the English and French Estimates, and eliminating from both all those items which related to pay and allowances which, on account of the system of conscription in the latter country, admitted of no fair comparison, he found the state of the case to be as follows:—The English Estimates for maintaining 146,000 men were £14,666,731, from which sum if £7,674,180 for pay and allowances, non-effective services were deducted, £6,992,551 would remain; and taking from that amount £1,200,000, which was devoted to the purpose of providing stores, ammunition, and guns for the navy, and to which there was in France no corresponding charge, a balance would be left of £5,792,551. Now, the French Estimates for maintaining 400,000 men were £14,000,000, and making from that sum a similar deduction as he had made from our Army Estimates for pay and allowances, he found that there remained a balance of only £4,000,000; so that, while for stores, barracks, fortifications, and ammunition of all descriptions, with an army of 400,000, the French spent only that amount, we expend more than five millions and a half for an army of 146,000 men. Now, it was, in his opinion, quite obvious that if we were to go on laying out money at that rate, a reaction against the expenditure would set in in the public mind, and he felt assured that they were speaking the true interests of the army who called attention to the subject in the spirit in which he felt it to be his duty to advert to it.
GENERAL PEELhoped his hon. and gallant Friend would not divide the House on this Motion. He would have been glad of an opportunity to make some remarks upon the fortifications of the country, but as the charge for them was not included in this Estimate it would not be in the power of the Under Secretary for War to give any explanations about them. His hon. and gallant Friend had calculated that the average cost per man had increased since 1854, from £75 to £100, but his hon. and gallant Friend had reckoned for the whole number of men voted in 1854, whereas nearly 10,000 of those men were never raised at all; and he had also forgotten that at that time the Commissariat was not under the War Department, 739 but under the Treasury. There is also a difference in the amount of stoppage in the daily pay, instead of the stoppage being 6d., it was only 4½d. per day, which is a boon to the soldiers of 1½d. per day. Hon. Members had pointed out where they thought the Estimates were too large, but it was his (General Peel's) misfortune to have to point out that the Estimates would not be sufficient to cover the expense to be provided for; that, in point of fact, on the 1st of April they had 3,000 men more than it had been proposed to vote money to pay for. The Government had deducted from the pay and allowances £127,000 as the pay and allowances of men who would be wanting to fill up the allowances. He had moved for a Return of the number of men on April 1, and he found the number of effectives on that day was 145,862, while the number to be voted was 146,044, so that only 182 men were wanted to complete the establishment. The number of men to be voted for India was 66,625, and the number of men actually on India establishment was 82,200, so that there was an excess of 15,575 men for India. He must say he did not see how this excess was to be provided for. The Under Secretary for War pointed out that reductions were to take place to the extent of five regiments of infantry and one regiment of cavalry. Was that reduction to take place in the Indian establishment?
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the strength of the regiments in China would be reduced to the peace establishment.
GENERAL PEELsaid, the establishments of the regiments in India were already in excess of their proper number by 15,000 men, and he wanted to know how the reduction was to take place. He did not see how they were to reduce the number of men in India, and dispose of the men. They must either discharge them, or wait till they were absorbed, which would take some time. If there were any Indian troops in China after April 1 they would entail extra expense on account of receiving Indian pay and allowances. Was that expense to be met out of the additional Vote of Credit asked for by the Chancellor of the Exchequer for the next financial year? He hoped, when they came to the specific Votes, the Under Secretary for War would be ready to afford full explanations.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONSir, the course pursued by hon. Gentlemen of asking questions and making observations, knowing that they can receive neither 740 answer nor refutation, is most inconvenient. The usual course of proceeding upon Army Estimates is founded on good sense, and well adapted for the convenience of the House. You, Sir, are moved out of the chair, the House goes into Committee; and when in Committee every Member may speak as often as he pleases. The Member therefore charged with the conduct of a particular Estimate can answer any number of questions without violating the rules of the House. The matters to be discussed are divided into a number of heads, so that, being taken one after another, the debate upon one may be kept separate and distinct from that which relates to the rest. But upon this occasion Members have got up and discussed the separate details of some twenty-two or twenty-three different Estimates, when the Under Secretary for War, having already spoken, by the rules of the House cannot answer any questions put to him. All the discussions which have taken place must, therefore, as far as answer or explanation or refutation go, be perfectly without any result. I should hope that the hon. Gentleman (Colonel Dickson) will have the goodness to follow the advice given him, and allow us at once to go into Committee, when all these questions may be answered upon the votes to which they belong, and when the most detailed explanations will be given by the Under Secretary for War. I should have confined myself to this request, had it not been for the speech of the hon. Member for Liskeard (Mr. B. Osborne). The hon. Gentleman is fond of sweeping assertions, and he has at his command a most ample vocabulary of strong words. Everything he disapproves of is a "job," and everything he does not like is absurd, ridiculous, foolish, and preposterous. But if we are to judge from the military opinions which he has given this evening, I think we may congratulate the country that its military defences do not depend on his knowledge and his decision. He is pleased to talk of "that extravagant job Aldershot." I deny that it is a job. On the contrary, I assert that there never was a wiser nor a more economical application of public money. It was known to be the great want of the British army that there was no place where a large number of men could be assembled together to learn combined movements. That feeling was so strong, that before Aldershot, Chobham was taken. But Chobham was very expensive; there 741 were large sums to be paid for compensation to those whose common rights were interfered with; and then Aldershot was purchased. It was bought at the rate of about £15 per acre, and nobody will maintain that that was a dear investment in land. If it were no longer needed for public purposes, I will venture to say that it would sell for many times more than that. The hon. Member found fault with the huts. Well, those huts were required suddenly. It might, perhaps, have been better, as it turned out, to build them of brick, instead of wood; but they would have taken much longer to build, and the public service required that the men should immediately be under huts. As for the use of Aldershot in forming your regiments, your officers, and your General Officers, I am quite sure that no military man whose opinion is worth having will agree with my hon. Friend's estimation of it. I hope, therefore, that those light and violent expressions of opinion which my hon. Friend is so fond of throwing right and left at everything in his way will have only their due weight with the House, and that they will prefer to give credence to those who are better judges of the matter than my hon. Friend. He talks about the demoralizing effects of Aldershot—I do not know what he means, but undoubtedly as far as the health of the troops goes they have been healthier there than at any station where an equal number of men have been collected together. Then, again, as to Portsdown Hill, he who has erected himself into a supreme judge of all military matters complains that if he were shut up there he should be undermined by the enemy. Now, mining and undermining imply a long siege; but does he suppose that we are going upon the assumption that a foreign enemy is to be left quiet at Portsdown until he can carry on the long operations of mining? The object of occupying Portsdown Hill is to prevent a force which might suddenly be landed upon the coast from at once taking up a position there which would give them the power of destroying our dockyards. It is nonsense to tell me that an enemy landing at Chichester, or some other such place on the coast, if Portsdown Hill were undefended, could not occupy it and do whatever damage he pleased to our dockyards at Portsmouth. The object of these fortifications is not to stand a regular siege like Coblentz, Mayence, or any of the great fortresses of 742 the Continent, but to prevent the enemy from taking possession of the hill by a coup de main, and if they can be maintained so long as to force the enemy to undermine them and blow them up, I shall think that they have fully answered their object.
CAPTAIN JERVIShoped that the result of this discussion would be that the Estimates would be presented in a more intelligible form next year, for in their present state it was difficult to learn from them what the army really cost us. One result of the perplexing form in which they were now given was to spread abroad an impression that the cost of the army was about £100 per man. He had taken a good deal of pains to go through the Estimates to find out the actual cost, and he found that the 146,000 men which had been voted cost just £7,216,181, or £49 per man. Deducting the force in the colonies, the 97,000 men stationed in this country, with 13,642 horses, cost just £54 11s. 8d. per man. According to Returns recently laid before the House, the cost of the Berkshire police was £58 per man; of the Kent police and of the metropolitan police £57 per man. So that our army, man for man, actually cost us less than our police. He did not agree with the Under Secretary for War that the Select Committee now sitting upstairs on the subject of Colonial army expenditure could lead to any great saving of expense as regarded our colonies. That question depended entirely on the political exigencies of the times. Malta, for instance, in 1853 cost £359,464; in 1855 it rose to £1,496,046; and in 1857 it fell to £442,722. So the Cape cost us for troops in 1853, £527,514; in 1856 the amount rose to £924,000; but in 1861 it cost us little more than Malta. A Committee which sat some years ago, and which included the late Lord Hardinge, the present Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Lord Derby, and other eminent men, reported that it could not by the offer of suggestions relieve the Executive Government from the duty of providing upon their own responsibility forces sufficient for the security of Her Majesty's possessions abroad, which even in time of peace were liable to variation on account of many contingencies. The only means of checking expenditure was to see clearly what was the cost of troops in the colonies, and what was the cost of the army at home on which they depended to defend the country. He wished to point out that the increase of the Esti- 743 mates since 1853 was referrible to the supply of materials for the future. Since that time there had been a great revolution in the engines of war, and on that account they must look forward to a large expenditure for several years. The hon. Member for the Queen's County (Col. Dunne) had moved for a Return of the materials in store, because without that knowledge no check on the expenditure could take place. If the House should at any time be of opinion that there was a sufficient stock in store they might refuse to vote more money. He should reserve other observations until the House was in Committee.
§ SIR HENRY WILLOUGHBYsaid, they voted money for regiments serving in the colonies, such as the 12th and 40th regiments, which were in Australia. If the colonies paid any portion of the expense he wanted to know how those sums were credited to the State? It was usual up to 1857, in all detailed accounts presented to the House, to give credit for such payments by the colonies; but latterly this did not appear in the accounts.
§ MR. CHILDERSsaid, the mode of accounting for the sums paid by the colonies was now the subject of inquiry before the Committee on Colonial and Military Expenditure. The question would require careful examination, and he hoped the Under Secretary for the War Department would not commit himself to any statement until the Committee had reported.
COLONEL NORTHsaid, the Committee on Military Organization which sat last year had made several suggestions, and he wished to know whether any of these recommendations had been or would be carried into effect?
MR. T. G. BARING, in reply to the last question, had to state that the Government was engaged in carrying gradually into effect the alterations approved by the Select Committee of last year. He would not shelter himself under the suggestion of the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. Childers), but would explain, in answer to the hon. Baronet, the Member for Evesham (Sir Henry Willoughby), that the extra allowances given to the troops in Australia were paid direct to the troops, and, therefore, did not come into our accounts. When there were fixed contributions paid by colonies for military expenditure the amounts were paid into the 744 Exchequer and appeared in the statement at the end of the Estimates. It was a proper subject of inquiry whether the allowances should not also be paid to the Exchequer.
With respect to the questions of the hon. and gallant Member for Chatham (Sir Frederic Smith), he would endeavour to answer them seriatim. No steps had actually been taken towards the establishment of a central depôt, the ground was being surveyed. The Fortification Loan of last year had been alluded to as a loan of £10,000,000 or £11,000,000; but he must remind the House that £5,345,000 was the extent to which the House committed itself under the Estimates which were laid on the table at the time. The plans for the works sanctioned by Parliament had all been settled and approved, with the following exceptions—and when he used the word "all," he meant those works for which estimates were presented. The exceptions were the batteries on the southwest side of the Isle of Wight, for which the Survey Department had not yet completed the survey of the ground; Maker Heights, at Plymouth, the design for the defences on which was under consideration; the north-east defences of Plymouth, the designs for which had been approved, but it was under consideration whether the line could not be modified so as to occupy land of less value than that required for the works already planned; Pembroke, the plans for the batteries on the coast to the south of which were in progress, but had not been finally approved; and Chatham, the plans for which were under consideration. Contracts, had been entered into for the works at Hurst Castle, Sandown Bay (Isle of Wight), the Needles, for some of the works on Portsdown Hill, and for the works for the defence of the Thames. Tenders were about to be accepted, either to-day or to-morrow, for the sea defences and for Staddon Heights at Plymouth, and also for works on the Isle of Grain for the defence of the Medway. The necessary steps were being taken for obtaining contracts as soon as possible for the remaining works at Portsdown, for the advanced Gosport works, for the works at Scoveston (Pembroke), for the proposed new work at Dover, and for the new defences at Cork. A considerable portion of all the land required had been purchased. A question had arisen with respect to the advisability of constructing the forts in the sea at 745 Spithead. The matter had been referred to the Commissioners of National Defence, and they had made their Report. The Inspector General of Fortifications, Sir John Burgoyne, had also given his opinion on the subject which was under the consideration of the Government, but no decision had as yet been arrived at with respect to it. As to whether it was the intention to lay on the table of the House detailed estimates of the probable cost of each work, these estimates had already been laid on the table in as great detail as could be done at the time when the House sanctioned the Loan. It was the understanding of the War Department that the House of Commons, in passing the Loan for two millions on account of the fortifications, pledged itself for the total cost of the undertaking, in the same way as when it gave a vote on account for any other works. The total estimate was £5,000,000 for new works, and £345,000 for works already sanctioned by Parliament. The Secretary for War would take care that the House of Commons was not committed to any expenditure in excess of that Estimate. As to the removal of the Invaliding Establishment and Medical School from Chatham to Netley, he had to state that the hospital at the latter place was not yet completed.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEAt the risk of disturbing the equanimity of the noble Lord at the head of the Government, who, from the tone of the remarks he addressed to the House, appears to be suffering from indigestion of the dinner at the Mansion House, I must say that the explanation offered by the Under Secretary for War in answer to my gallant Friend opposite is exceedingly evasive and unsatisfactory. We are told that works are in progress, the plans for which have not as yet been finally approved.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEThen that means, I suppose, that the plans laid before this House and for which the money was voted have been altered. If I had said such a thing, I should have been told that I was "light and violent." I have always remarked that any one who happens to differ from the noble Lord is supposed to have studied in the school of lightness and to be subject to fits of violence. Standing here as an independent Member of Parliament, and not returned 746 through the influence of the noble Lord, I shall take the liberty whenever public money is granted to criticize even his own pet projects and to object to them when they are extravagant. When the noble Lord tells me that I rest on my own simple opinion, I say that I do not presume to form one for myself on such a question. I am fortified by the opinion of the Inspector General of Fortifications, who in his evidence before the Commission pronounced these works unnecessary and extravagant; and also by the opinion of the distinguished Engineer officer opposite (Sir Frederic Smith), which is surely as well entitled to respect as the ipse dixit of the noble Lord. We shall be told some day that the £5,000,000 has been all spent, and nothing more. All we can gather is, that the plan which the House was called upon to sanction in a most indecent hurry—I may say, in a "light and violent" way—has been altered, and that we are to have no consideration of the Estimates. We are told that we must go into Committee directly, that it is our business to pass the Votes, but not to consider them. I have been educated in the belief that when we went into Committee of Supply it was for the purpose of considering the Estimates, and I intend to adhere to it. I make every allowance for the irritation of the noble Lord, who is no doubt suffering from the effects of large doses of colchicum; but, whatever tone he may assume towards me, I put it to the House whether the explanation of the Under Secretary was at all satisfactory.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONI am very sorry that what I said should have so disturbed the equanimity of my hon. Friend. I am certainly inclined to prescribe for my hon. Friend a dose of that very colchicum to which he has alluded, reminding him at the same time that colchicum is rather sedative than exciting in its operation. The matter to which the hon. Gentleman's observations relate forms no part of what we are going to consider this evening, because the question of the fortifications is entirely separate from the Army Estimates, and the Votes to be passed do not bear on it. When my hon. Friend the Under Secretary stated that the plans had not been finally determined upon, but were still under consideration, he did not mean, as my hon. Friend the Member for Liskeard assumes, that the general plan of the fortifications had been altered, although there may have been some modification in de- 747 tails. It is obvious that when we are going to construct fortifications at a large expense for an important object it is essential that the working plans should be most maturely considered over and over again by the persons most competent to judge, so that no mistake may be made. What my hon. Friend meant to say was that the plans had been carefully examined by competent scientific men, and that while some of them have been finally determined upon, others are not yet sufficiently settled to enable us to make contracts upon them.
GENERAL LINDSAYregretted that the Under Secretary had not given a more distinct answer as to military organization. The Committee on that subject had pronounced very strongly in favour of a large infusion of the military element into the War Department, and of having a permanent Under Secretary, not removable on each change of Administration.
SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, the replies of the hon. Gentleman opposite were very courteous, but he agreed with the hon. and gallant Member (General Lindsay) in thinking them very unsatisfactory. When so large a sum of money was about to be spent they ought to know the manner in which, and the matter upon which, it was to be spent, and until satisfactory estimates of the kind asked for were supplied he for one should oppose any further Votes.
§ Question "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
§ Put, and agreed to.
§ Main Question put, and agreed to.
§ House in Committee.
§ Mr. in the Chair.
§ (In the Committee.)
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £1,780,000, be granted to Her Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge of Pay and Allowances to Her Majesty's Land Forces, at Home and Abroad, exclusive of India, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1862, inclusive.
§ LORD WILLIAM GRAHAMcomplained that the charges for colonial military expenditure were so scattered, that it was almost impossible to ascertain the amount spent on any particular colony. A Committee had been appointed to look into our colonial military expenditure, and under these circumstances it was very natural to turn to these Estimates to see what was the amount spent upon each colony—but that was nowhere to be found—they were 748 scattered under all kinds of heads, and in almost every page of the Estimates. He had, however, taken the trouble to ferret out the different items to the best of his ability, and he would just read to the different House the charges for two or three of the colonies, just to show the vast variety of heads under which they lay concealed. The Votes for Nova Scotia were—Foreign Staff, £6,169; store department, £990; prison at Halifax, £761; completion of glacis of citadel, £500; erecting block buildings at Wellington-barracks, &c., £2,766; new works under £1,000, £491; Engineer district, £669; renewing wharf at Halifax, £3,000, making a total of £15,346, to be found under eight different heads. The Votes for Gibraltar were—Poreign Staff, £6,768; store department, £1,250; prison, £690; new works, £3,000; works under £1,000, £800; civil buildings, £251; erection of huts, £6,500; extension of commissariat magazines,£2,700; Engineer districts £400; making a total of £22,359, scattered over nine different pages of the Estimates. The worst case of all was that of Malta. The Votes were—Foreign Staff, £10,326; store department, £1,420; Malta Fencible Artillery, under four heads, £9,282; improving defences, £5,000; altering defences, £2,000; new works under £1,000, £831; civil buildings ditto, £498; increasing barracks and rifle ranges, £3,877; prison, £1,228; Engineer districts, £1,375; construction of canal, £2,000; making a total of £39,837, for which we had to look under fourteen different heads. It was the same with the Votes for the Ionian Islands, the Mauritius, Bermuda, and other colonies. The existing system of making up the Estimates necessarily led to great complexity; and, in nine cases out of every ten, nobody except the Under Secretary for War could be expected to know what was the precise sum required for the colonies. He trusted that the hon. Gentleman would on future occasions give the House a column showing the total amount wanted for each colony.
§ Mr. W. WILLIAMScomplained that the Army Estimates for the present year amounted to the enormous sum of upwards of £14,000,000, and contended that it was impossible in a Committee of the Whole House to do justice to almost any one of the items. All that could be done was by pointing out the items of increase over the same items of the Estimates of last year, of which the hon. Member pointed out several instances.
COLONEL DUNNErequested some explanation relative to the item of £40,000 for recruiting. The expenses of recruiting seemed to have unreasonably increased this year. The Commissioners appointed last year to examine into the subject of recruiting estimated that the number of recruits annually amounted to an average number of 18,000 men. Now, the hon. Gentleman had said that the Government intended to reduce the army by 16,000 men, and he also admits that there are some five thousand men supernumerary both in India and at home, and all these reductions are to be effected by stopping all recruiting; now, if this be the case will the hon. Gentleman state to the House why he asks the sum of £40,000 for levy money for recruiting? There was also an increase this year in the number of supernumeraries in regiments. He found that majors coming home from India were to be left on the strength of the regiment, and this he supposed would account partly for the increase; but why should majors be kept on when lieutenant-colonels were to be put on half-pay? Two lieutenant-colonels, Colonel Tyler and Colonel Anslie had just been placed on half-pay; Colonel Tyler had seen much active service, and was through most of the campaigns in India, and he had been before placed on half-pay as major; for it would seem strange to the House to learn that some time since majors were placed on half-pay, but now it was the order that lieutenant-colonels who were second lieutentant-colonels in regiments should be reduced when those regiments returned from India. He (Colonel Dunne) complained of these anomalies, no officers would trust to orders so capriciously and unjustly changed without any apparent reason. It was a paltry saving to dismiss two lieutenant-colonels; but under the circumstances it was, he thought, specially unjustifiable. Then at the end of the Vote under discussion he found an item "For men wanting to complete establishment." How could this be reconciled with the statement that there was a large supernumerary force? He wished an explanation to be given upon these matters, and he thought it due to the House and the country.
COLONEL DICKSONsaid, the military expenses of this year were £16,000,000, instead of £14,600,000, as the hon. Member opposite (Mr. Williams) had remarked, because one of the great items of reduction said to have been made was £437,470 on 750 account of fortifications; but that was a Vote of last year, and, therefore, the reduction could not be said to be due to this year; and as beyond that there was but a nominal reduction of £185,795, subtracting this sum from the former left a balance which in reality was an increase in this year's expenditure of £251,675. Then there was an increase of £500,000 for that ill-used force the militia; an increase of £9,000 in the medical staff; and an increase during the last two years—in one year of £50,000, in the other of £40,000, making together nearly £100,000—in the simple item of hospital diet. The latter increase, he thought, certainly required explanation, considering that there were never more on the average than 7 per cent of men in hospital at any one time. There was no use sitting there night after night discussing these Estimates; and unless the items to which he had alluded were satisfactorily explained by the hon. Gentleman he would certainly divide the Committee.
GENERAL LINDSAYsaid, that his opinion went rather in the direction of the extension than the reduction of the medical provision for the army. The medical staff was considerably increased, but it was understood that there was an intention on the part of the War Department that regiments were to be reduced by one assistant-surgeon. Now, he did not believe that an officer coming from the staff to do duty with a regiment would be at all able to do the duty as well as an assistant-surgeon. He knew, however, that the order for this reduction had in some instances gone out. Dr. Gibson, Director of the Medical Department, stated in his evidence that the medical attendance upon a regiment would unquestionably be better performed by having two assistant-surgeons; and that, regard being had to the contingencies of sickness and the necessity for occasional leave of absence, there was sufficient to do to keep at work the surgeon and two assistant-surgeons. In the Metropolis, since the barracks were permanently divided, there would be only ten medical officers to perform the duties that required eleven in winter and twelve in summer. The consequence was that no medical officer could get leave of absence. This was more felt in London, where the men were permanently in detached quarters. As a commanding officer he did not think it right that 200 or 250 men at any of the London barracks should be left without a medical officer, particularly during 751 the night. In the country, a hospital was attached to every barrack; but in London the hospitals were remote from the barracks it was necessary that an officer should live east of the hospital. The Sanitary Committee had recommended that increased leave of absence should be given to the medical officers of the army, and he trusted that the War Department would carry this recommendation into effect. He wished to direct attention to the subject of lance sergeants and lance corporals, particularly the latter. The Commission on Recruiting the Army had pointed out the desirability of some small addition being made to the pay of lance corporals. The corporals of each regiment not being in sufficient number, a certain selection of the most eligible men was made, who were called lance or acting corporals. They received no pay, but while in certain regiments they got on pretty quickly, in others their promotion was very slow. They had to perform onerous duties, and they ought to receive some small amount of pay. Another important question had reference to the reenlistment of soldiers. Every officer knew the value of old soldiers to a regiment, and after a soldier had served ten years under limited enlistment, it would be highly desirable to offer him some inducement to remain in the regiment by an increase of, say, 2d. a day in his pay. At present some of them re-enlisted in other regiments, but very few indeed re-enlisted in their own. Unless the War Office accepted the suggestion of his Royal Highness the Duke of Cambridge, and enlisted for sixteen years, with a small pension at the end of that term, some inducement to old soldiers to re-enlist, in the shape of a small increase of pay, was greatly needed.
COLONEL KNOXsaid, he also deprecated any reduction in the number of the assistant surgeons, and he had been requested by several commanding officers to bring the subject to the attention of the House. It was a question of the most vital importance to the sanitary condition of the army generally, but especially so in London, where the barracks were separated and the men dispersed; and it was always necessary that in the barracks there should be medical men on the spot. The St. John's Wood Barracks, he was sorry to find, were not likely to be got rid of. They were obliged to have 300 men located there, and no man would say that a medical officer ought not to be constantly there. If the proposed reduction of one assistant-surgeon 752 were carried out, not one of the existing army surgeons could obtain, what every other officer of the army had, leave of absence for a limited period every year.
COLONEL NORTHdid not look with the same horror as some of his friends did on the great expense of the medical department. They had no right to blow hot and cold on the subject. The Sanitary Commission recommended most of these changes, and the thanks of the Committee were due to the Government for the prompt manner in which they had carried out those recommendations. But he must join in the hope expressed by other Members that the number of assistant surgeons in the home battalions should not be reduced.
CAPTAIN JERVISasked when the Report of the Committee on the sanitary condition of the army would be laid upon the table of the House? It was promised last year, and if it had been laid on the table with the Estimates, much of this discussion might have been avoided.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, that a Sanitary Report on the army would be laid on the table in future. With regard to the discrepancy between the money asked for and the number of men voted, referred to by right hon. and gallant Gentleman opposite (General Peel) he had to observe that that could be accounted for in various ways. The number of men, for example, would be reduced by those serving in China coming home, and by a consequent reduction of the strength of the regiments. Besides, regiments on foreign service were found to diminish fast enough; the right hon. and gallant Gentleman might depend upon it that the number of men would be brought down to a level with the money voted. Recruiting had been checked. In 1860 the recruiting averaged 2,300 a month; but in February last the number was only 1,300; in March, 1,000; and in the first half of April, 250. The discrepancy to which reference had been made was not an exceptional case, for he found that it had occurred in previous years, and must necessarily occur when establishments were reduced. In 1859, for instance, the number of men was 5,000 in excess of the money voted. The noble Lord (Lord W. Graham) had called attention to the colonial military expenditure. The subject was now under the consideration of a Committee upstairs, but he could see no objection to a Return as asked for by the noble Lord, showing the amount to be expended in each particular 753 colony being given every year. With respect to the number of men borne on the British establishment, he should explain that when a regiment was expected to return from India in the course of the year the numbers were transferred at once from the Indian to the British establishment in the Estimates; although they did not come on the charge for the whole year, but were only paid out of the British Exchequer when they arrived in this country. The hon. and gallant Gentleman the Member for Wigan (Colonel Lindsay) whose opinion on all subjects connected with the army was of great value, had referred to the medical staff and the reduction of regimental assistant-surgeons; but he thought that subject might safely be left to be dealt with by the noble Lord the Secretary of State for War. No real reduction would at present take place. With respect to the recommendations of the Royal Commission on Recruiting, their Report was a very valuable one, but the subject required great care and consideration. A Vote of £20,000 would be taken on that account.
COLONEL NORTHurged that command-money should be given to officers in command of the artillery and cavalry regiments as well to infantry.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMScomplained of the increase which had taken place in the expense of the staff appointments. The foreign staff cost £193,557, that at home £133,345, making altogether the expense of the staff at home and abroad £326,898. He thought this charge enormously extravagant, and called for reduction. He could not see why they should have a staff at the Ionian Islands. These Islands were an enormous expense to this country. They were anxious to part from us, and he could not see what we could possibly gain by retaining them.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEasked what was the meaning of the appointment of a new officer styled "Major-General commanding the brigade of Foot Guards?" This might be a very good appointment—he had no doubt it was; but if so, why keep up the offices of these three colonels who used to take this command in turn? He also wished to know what was the use of a Major-General for the Australian Colonies, where there were only a few troops—not more than one or two regiments? At the present moment Australia was entirely denuded of troops. Was the lieutenant-general for Australia to be only 754 temporary, appointed only for the exigencies of the occasion, in consequence of the war in New Zealand, or was he to be in permanence? Then he found also a Major-General of Nova Scotia, and "allowance to ditto in lieu of the government of Annapolis Royal." He wished to know what this meant.
§ GENERAL UPTONsaid, the appointment of a Major General to command the brigade of Guards arose from the Adjutant General wishing to be relieved from the trouble of having to deal with courts-martial and other duties connected with the brigade. He (General Upton) was of opinion that, as far as the discipline of the Guards was concerned, that officer was not required. The Guards got on quite as well before the appointment of a Major General as it did now.
§ MR. CHILDERSthought if no better justification for the appointment could be offered than the explanation of the gallant General the Committee ought not to confirm the appointment. He begged to thank the Under Secretary of State for his promise in future to shape the Estimates so as to show the distinct expenditure in each colony and foreign station, and the sums received from the colonies on account. He also wished to confirm the statement of the hon. Member for Liskeard (Mr. Osborne) as to the absence of any necessity for two General officers in the Australian colonies. Since the commencement of the difficulties in New Zealand all the troops had been removed from the Australian colonies, and the military duties had been entirely performed by Volunteers. He did not think the explanation respecting the medical staff was at all satisfactory. He wished to call the attention of the Committee to the great increase—nearly double—in the number of staff surgeons at the Cape. The troops had been diminished in number about one-third, the medical staff had been increased from seventeen to thirty; and he hoped the Committee would not agree to that increase.
MAJOR STUART KNOXconcurred in the opinion that a Major General commanding the Brigade of Guards was not necessary. That officer could have nothing to do but what was done in the Line by the colonels of regiments.
COLONEL DICKSONreferred to the item for Miscellaneous and Contingencies, which amounted to £75,000, out of a total estimate for the Staff of £326,000, and said he thought that was a large amount to 755 vote under such a head. He thought it would have been better to have retained the additional assistant-surgeon than to have made fresh medical staff appointments. He should take the sense of the Committee upon the items for additional staff surgeons, and for the Major General commanding the Brigade of Guards.
§ LORD ALFRED CHURCHILLcondemned the appointment of Major General of the Brigade of Guards. The duties now performed by that officer had been previously performed by the Major of Brigade in waiting, and during the Crimean war Lord Rokeby, who commanded the first division, filled that post. After the war he continued to do the duties as Major General; but, his period of service having expired, a change was about to take place; indeed, it was stated that Major General Crawford was already appointed. The post was a perfect sinecure, and the estimate for it amounted altogether to £1,038. As he entertained a strong opinion upon the point, he hoped the sense of the Committee would be taken upon it.
COLONEL DICKSONmoved to reduce the Vote by the sum of £9,823, being the amount of increase upon the cost of the medical staff.
MR. T. G. BARINGthought the hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Dickson) would hardly persevere in his Motion to reduce this Vote, when he explained that the effect would be to oblige the War Office at once to place upon half-pay a number of medical officers and so to throw an additional charge on the half-pay Vote. The economy to the public would be very small, and those medical officers would suffer a considerable loss. With regard to the expenses of medical staff establishments in the colonies, that was a subject which might be considered by the Committee upstairs on colonial expenditure. There were at present more staff assistant-surgeons than were wanted, and it was necessary to place a certain number of them on half-pay. But the effect of the Amendment of the hon. and gallant Member would be to disorganize the medical service altogether, for still more staff assistant-surgeons would have to be placed on half-pay, and as by the terms of medical warrant only the juniors of each rank could be reduced, it would involve a considerable expense in bringing home some of these medical officers from distant parts of the world.
§ MR. CHILDERSrepeated his objection 756 to this item, and said that the Committee sitting upstairs on colonial military expenditure had no power to investigate these items, but only to consider one special subject—what proportion of the military expenses should be borne by the colony and what by the mother country?
COLONEL NORTHdid not think an increase of the medical staff in unhealthy climates was any injury to the country. It was better to have too many than too few medical officers to attend to the health of the troops.
§ MAJOR ANSONreferred to the increase in the charge for the medical staff in China which was £13,700 last year and was now £14,468 although we had fewer troops in that country.
MR. T. G. BARINGexplained that there had been promotions in China, and that it was impossible in so distant a country always to keep the medical staff within the numbers voted by Parliament. He repeated that the Amendment, if carried, would effect an insignificant saving and would entail a good deal of difficulty and trouble.
COLONEL DICKSONsaid, he did not wish to take one medical officer off the staff. There were plenty of means of reducing the expenditure without interfering with the medical officers, and therefore he should take the sense of the Committee on the Vote.
§ SIR HARRY VERNEYthought it was so important to take every possible means of preserving the health of the soldiers as a mere question of economy that he hoped this Vote would not be hastily reduced.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, whenever they put their finger on a Vote on which there was a chance of effecting a saving a plea ad misericordiam was made on behalf of those who would be touched by it. Now, it was on behalf of the poor surgeons who were put on half-pay. There ought to be some consideration for the poor taxpayers. A case had been made out for the reduction, and he hoped the Amendment would be pressed to a division; it would then be seen who were ready to vote for tangible reforms.
§ COLONEL SYKESsaid, so far from there being an increase in the number of medical officers in India, there had been a diminution. Several students who had come to England to complete their medical education in order to enter the service had been rejected because they had rather darker skins than Europeans.
§ MR. BRISCOEthought it was the first duty of the House to provide for the health of the troops; but when they were distinctly told that there were more surgeons in the service than necessary, he was at a loss to conceive how there could he a difference of opinion on the Vote. He should support the reduction.
§ MR. CARNEGIEdid not see how the reduction could be made without adding to the assistant-surgeons of regiments.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, that in order to reduce the assistant-surgeons to the number for which the Vote was taken it was necessary to place about thirty on half-pay.
MR. T. G. BARINGNo regimental assistant-surgeon would be placed on half-pay; all the assistant-surgeons reduced were then on the staff.
COLONEL DICKSONdid not wish to see the number of the regimental medical officers reduced, but he wished to protest against what seemed to him a mere crotchet of the Secretary of War.
§ SIR JOSEPH PAXTONsaid, two years ago the House was applauding the Secretary of War for the measures he took to promote and preserve the health of the army. The House of Commons was then unanimous in doing him honour for his efforts; and to-night, when a Vote was required for the same purpose, it was proposed to reduce it. After having urged the Secretary of War to take the steps he had done, it was rather hard on him to blame him now for taking them. He should oppose the reduction.
§
Motion made, and Question put,
That the Item of £105,031, for the Medical Staff, be reduced by the sum of £9,823.
§ The Committee divided:—Ayes 46; Noes 66: Majority 20.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ LORD ALFRED CHURCHILLmoved the reduction of the Vote by a sum of £1,038 the pay of the Major General, commanding the Brigade of Foot Guards and of his staff.
GENERAL LINDSAYsupported the item, and said that the arrangement of having a Major General commanding the Brigade of Foot Guards was no new one; it was an arrangement of former times revived. By an order dated in June, 1811, a gallant officer was appointed to that post, though with a more extended command. He entirely denied the asser- 758 tion that this command was made for Lord Rokeby. On the contrary, it was part of a scheme that was carried out in 1856 in every part of the empire to organize the army in divisions and brigades. With respect to the Adjutant General who used to command the Home district, he would remind hon. Members that the business of the War Department had so much increased that that gallant officer had become little more than a clerk in his own office, to which he was now entirely confined, and he had almost ceased to perform the inspectional and military functions attached to the department. Though the portion of the army commanded by the Major General, whose appointment was objected to, was called a brigade, it was a division of seven battalions, and each lieutenant colonel commanding a regiment of Guards was, in point of fact, a brigadier. The regiment which he had lately the honour to command had three battalions, and the other regiments of Guards had two each. Those three battalions were worked almost as one; and such was the uniform system of organization in each regiment of Guards that if it was the pleasure of the Government to order a brigade of 3,400 men to leave for foreign service within twenty-four hours they could be put on board ship within that time without the slightest difficulty. The same could not be done with other troops for this reason: no regiment could start on an expedition without leaving behind the sick, the weakly men, and a depôt to maintain the numbers which reduced the number of effectives, and caused the worst of systems volunteering from one regiment to another. The system of having a Major General commanding the Brigade of Guards had been found to work well, and was a link in the chain of responsibility. The lieutenant-colonels in command of regiments had also very important duties to perform. They conducted the finance, the recruiting, the correspondence, and they worked three battalions as if they were one. No general could do this; an officer in command of a battalion, though senior of his rank, but co-equal with others, could not perform the functions of the lieutenant-colonel who had the moral and physical influence which his superior position afforded him; and he believed that they discharged it with great advantage to the public service.
COLONEL DUNNEdid not agree with those who advocated this appointment; 759 and he thought the general opinion of the Committee was against it. This appointment had originally been made for Lord Rokeby when he returned from the Crimea: and, he need hardly say every one who knew that gallant officer rejoiced at anything that could be conferred upon so gallant a soldier, but he had now got a regiment, and why continue the appointment? He was not, however, disposed to attack individuals appointed to particular appointments. He proposed calling attention to the fact of the great increase in the expense of the staff generally. In 1815 and 1816, when there were 335,000 of the regular troops under arms, the cost of the staff was only £277,866. At present, with a force of only 146,000 men, it was £326,898. We had a staff sufficient for an army of 500,000 men, and far more than was required, but even to the numbers he would less object, were the appointments distributed fairly to the cavalry; the rule preventing an officer serving more than five years on the staff was applied only to those who had no interest but their merit, and evaded for purposes of periodic extension; he, therefore, hoped that not only this useless appointment but many others on the staff would be reduced.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, the gallant General the Member for Antrim, who had a greater knowledge of the Guards than any officer in that brigade, had told the House that this was an unnecessary appointment. The discipline of the Guards, which they knew had always been remarkable, was carried on—the gallant General declared—to perfection under the old system, by which the colonels took command monthly. The gallant General the Member for Wigan (General Lindsay) on the contrary—who had but lately been made a General—declared, on the authority of a precedent in 1811, that this appointment was no novelty in the Guards, and called on the House to vote £1,038 for its maintenance. He supposed the gallant General had voted in the majority on a late occasion with those Gentlemen who signed the economical address at the beginning of the year, and afterwards gave such excellent reasons to themselves for walking into the opposite lobby. He hoped they would now revert to their first impressions, and march under the gallant General the Member for Antrim into the same lobby in which it was his intention to divide.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, after the 760 clear explanation of the reasons for this appointment which had been given by the gallant General the Member for Wigan (General Lindsay), it would be unnecessary for him to enter on the discussion of a purely military question, in which his opinion could carry no weight. It was evident, however, that the discipline of a body embracing several battalions would be more successfully maintained under the present system than if constant changes took place in the commanding officer, and if anything like uniformity of system were thereby prevented. He was not prepared to admit the justice of the appeal made by the hon. Member for Liskeard to the advocates for economy. No doubt the people of this country required economy to be consulted, but they did not wish to see it enforced unless a clear case of extravagant expenditure were shown. It was a mistake to suppose that this was a new appointment; it was a simple continuation of one which had existed last year and the year before.
§ MR. MONSELLsaid, the only argument which could be employed to justify the Vote was that the discipline of the Guards had for a long time been unsatisfactory, whereas he had always believed those regiments to be in the highest state of efficiency. Unless some step were taken to put a stop to the enormous growth of the Army Estimates, it was impossible to predict to what amount they would swell, and the country in self-defence would be forced to resist some Vote, which perhaps might prove to be absolutely necessary for the defence of the country.
COLONEL KNOXsaid, that having served in the Guards for twenty-five years, he had come to the conclusion that the appointment was in reality unnecessary. At the close of the Crimean war two distinguished officers—Lord Clyde and Lord Rokeby—had to be provided for. The office of Inspector General of Infantry was created for Lord Clyde, and that of Inspector of the Brigade of Guards for Lord Rokeby. The duties of Inspector General of Infantry were necessarily very limited, as he was not allowed to inspect in any district where there was a General commanding. The Inspector of the Brigade of Guards was useful to a certain extent; but he should be in favour of increasing the radius of his command, making him responsible for the safety of the arrondissement of the Metropolis. But if the choice lay between retaining this 761 officer in his present position, and doing away with the three colonels of the regiments, he would say—speaking from twenty-five years' experience in the Guards—by all means let the Inspector of the Brigade go, and the Guards would get on as well as they had ever done.
§ MR. CONINGHAMknew that Lord Clyde had been appointed Inspector General of Infantry on his return from the Crimea, but denied that the post had been created specially for him; the fact being that he came in under the reorganization of the military system which at that time was being carried out. About the office in connection with the Guards he knew nothing; but it deserved consideration whether these two appointments might not he advantageously combined.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that the whole question turned really upon what was the best system of military organization. For his part he thought the proposed change would tend to improve the efficiency of the Guards. He did not mean to say that Members who were not military men were not capable of forming an opinion upon a purely military matter, but he thought they ought to give due weight to the opinion of an hon. and gallant Gentleman who was animated by no other wish than the good of the service. According to the best opinion that could be formed in the military Department this was the arrangement best calculated to ensure the efficiency of that valuable nucleus of our military force, the Guards. The question was whether the six battalions of the Guards were to be alternately under the command of the different officers belonging to the regiment or under the permanent command of one Major General. It seemed clear to him that for the sake of unity of system and regularity of arrangement the latter was best. It might be a matter of opinion in the House of Commons what should he the amount of the military force, but everybody agreed that whatever was its amount it ought to be made as efficient as possible; and it was clear that the Guards would be more efficient if their discipline was more uniform and they were placed under the inspection and command of one officer instead of under several officers who were changed from month to month. He submitted that this was a change which was calculated to promote the efficiency of the Guards. At any rate he hoped the Committee would place confidence in the opinion of the military 762 authorities and sanction the proposed arrangement.
§ LORD ALFRED CHURCHILLpointed out an inconvenience that would result in case any unforeseen contingency rendered it necessary to bring a large number of troops up to London. They would be under a separate command, and the Major General commanding the Guards would have the command over those regiments. He thought that all the troops in a dis-district should be under the command of the officer in the district, and that no single regiment should have a separate commander. Considering the enormous amount of the expenditure, and considering what the Chancellor of the Exchequer had said the other evening, he thought it was their duty to object to every Vote which was not thoroughly proved to be good.
§
Motion made and Question put,
That the item of £1,038, for the Major General commanding the Brigade of Guards, and his Staff, be omitted from the proposed Vote.
§ The Committee divided: —Ayes 86, Noes, 89: Majority 3.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEasked for explanation as to the item of £691 for allowance to a Major General in lieu of the Government of Annapolis Royal, and, in case he should not get a satisfactory reply, proposed the reduction of the Vote by that amount.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the item of £691, for Allowance to a Major General, in lieu of the Government of Annapolis Royal, be omitted from the proposed Vote.
MR. T. G. BARINGexplained that the sum of £691 allowance to the Major General, was an allowance made to him on the abolition of the office of Governor of Annapolis Royal in the Bay of Fundy, which appointment was held by the Commander of the Forces in Nova Scotia until that office was abolished.
CAPTAIN JERVISsaid, that the objection to the Vote might be got rid of if it had been explained that this was table money.
§ MR. BERNAL OSBORNEsaid, that after the explanation of the hon. Gentleman opposite, he should not divide.
§ MR. HUNTthen proposed the omission of the Vote in page 7 of Miscellaneous and Contingencies, amounting to £75,028, on the ground that there was no explanation of the item.
§ MR. AUGUSTUS SMITHsaid, that 763 there was no item in page 29 corresponding with the item of £75,000 in page 7.
§ MR. CHILDERSasked, how it was that the number of surgeons at the Cape had been so largely increased? It could hardly be from the sickness prevalent there, for the Cape was among the healthiest of our colonies.
MR. T. G. BARINGcould not explain precisely how this increase had been occasioned, but promised that the medical staff at the Cape should be carefully looked to.
COLONEL DICKSONcomplained that no explanation was given of the sum of £75,028 for "Miscellaneous and Contingencies," and, to afford an opportunity for explanation, moved the omission of this item.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, that it was made up of certain small items connected with the Medical Staff and the Commissariat.
§ SIR FREDERIC SMITHsaid, the Committee wanted to know what were the Contingencies, and he would suggest that the Vote be deferred.
§ SIR HENRY WILLOUGHBYsaid, the Chancellor of the Exchequer had made such a fearful onslaught upon the Members of the House in sanctioning whatever expenditure was proposed, that to set themselves right with the country they ought to insist on examining every item of the Estimates. This particular Vote had increased within the last year or two, and the Committee ought not to be called upon to pass it without knowing something of the causes that had led to that increase.
§ LORD JOHN RUSSELLsaid, it was obvious on the face of the Estimate that there was a reduction of £5,000 with regard to this particular item, and he could not see that any sufficient grounds had been urged for postponing this Vote. It was asked why they did not specify all the Contingencies. He doubted very much whether if all these details were to be specified, they would add to the clearness of the Estimates. The details would fill several volumes, and the better plan was, in his opinion, to take a sum in gross, leaving to the Committee to consider whether such a sum was too large for the purposes required.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ MR. HUNTthought the noble Lord had overlooked the fact that this item was one-fourth of the whole Vote.
GENERAL PEELsaw no advantage in having every item detailed. As was said the other night, such details would be too bulky to come in at the doors. They might depend upon it the Secretary for War would have been too happy to reduce the Vote if he could have done so.
§ MR. AUGUSTUS SMITHsaid, they did not want all the details, but details which they could understand. All sorts of items were mixed up together, and he suggested that they should have a clear and comprehensive analysis of what the £75,000 consisted. He hoped the hon. Member would persevere in his Motion for the postponement of the Vote.
§ MR. MONSELLsaid, they did not want the details, but they did want to know how much was for clerks and how much for Contingencies.
COLONEL DICKSONthought that a quarter of £326,698 was a large sum for clerks and Contingencies. A majority of the House talked about economy either there or outside, and they were expected to vote this large estimate without any attempt at reduction.
§ SIR MORTON PETOunderstood there were 600 clerks in the War Office, but could not conceive how so many could possibly be judiciously or properly employed. There was a sum of £9,000 voted for messengers at the Admiralty. They were too much in the habit of voting sums in the bulk without knowing enough about them. The Vote ought to be postponed or a division made of the two amounts for clerks and contingencies.
§ MR. MASSEYsaid, the Motion must be to omit the item. If the Vote were not withdrawn, it was not competent to move that it be postponed.
MR. T. G. BARINGhoped the Committee would agree to the Vote. There would be no objection to grant a return of the expenditure in any detail required.
§
Motion made, and Question put,
That the item of £75,028, for Miscellaneous and Contingencies of the Staff, be omitted from the proposed Vote.
§ The Committee divided:—Ayes 28; Noes 182: Majority 154.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ MR. CONINGHAMmoved the omission of the item of £10,061 for the annual allowances for the officers of the regiment of the Grenadier Guards. The allowances for the officers of a regiment of the Line Were only £408. No doubt the number of men in one regiment was much larger than in 765 the other, but the difference in the allowances was out of all proportion.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the item of £10,061, for the Annual Allowances of the Grenadier Guards, be omitted from the proposed Vote.
LORD DUNKELLINpointed out that the £408 to which the hon. Gentleman had referred was only for one battalion, while the Grenadier Guards consisted of three battalions.
§ MR. CONINGHAMreplied that the allowance for three battalions of the Line at the same rate would only be £1,200 and odd. He should like to hear some explanation of the discrepancy from the Under Secretary for War.
Mr. T. G. BARINGstated that the allowances to the Grenadiers Guards included payment for recruiting services and hospital expenses.
§ MR. H. A. BRUCEobserved that the proportion of officers to men in the Grenadiers was excessive compared with other regiments.
GENERAL LINDSAYsaid, that this sum had been voted from year to year, in order to provide for the recruiting service and for hospital expenses, and the accounts were presented every half-year to the Secretary for War, and passed like all other public accounts. Every information upon the whole subject was contained in the Report of the evidence laid before a Committee of the House of Commons in 1850, and in the Appendix to that Report. An investigation took place that year into the general subject of these allowances to the Army, including the Guards, and it was shown that the expenses of the Guards, under these heads, were only a penny a man higher than for the other regiments.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, that in the Life Guards there was one officer to every ten men, and a non-commissioned officer to every five, while in the cavalry of the Line there was only one officer to sixteen men, and a non-commissioned officer to nine-and-a-half. He objected to such a waste of money on these Household troops, who, it was well known, had no duties whatever to perform, except occasionally attending Her Majesty. The Foot Guards cost more than the regiments of the Line by at least 30 per cent; and a lieutenant-colonel in the Foot Guards had £1 6s. 9d. per day, while a lieutenant-colonel in the Line had only 17s.; the majors in the Foot Guards had £1 3s. per day, while 766 the majors in the regiments of the Line had only 16s. per day. He wanted to know what use the Foot Guards had for three attorneys?
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Original Question put, and agreed to.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £648,096, be granted to Her Majesty, to defray the Charge of the Miscellaneous Charges of Her Majesty's Land Forces at Home and Abroad, exclusive of India, which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1862, inclusive.
MAJOR STUART KNOXcondemned depôt battalions as injurious to the service. They were suppressed by the late Duke of Wellington, and revived during the Crimean War, when arrangements were made in a great hurry and without due consideration. Almost every colonel in the army had pronounced strongly against them, as productive of laxity of discipline and a want of esprit de corps among the men. If commanding officers of regiments happened to be quartered in places where their own depôts were stationed they had no authority over them. Such a state of things ought not to exist. He moved that the Vote be reduced by the sum of £41,337, the item for depôt battalions.
COLONEL NORTHsaid, he would acknowledge that he was at one time very much prejudiced against these depôt battalions, but he had thought it as well to go down to Chatham and judge for himself. He must say he never saw anything more perfect than the movements of the depôt battalions, under General Eyre's command. The system might be attended with some expense, but he felt sure there was very great advantage in it.
CAPTAIN JERVISobserved that there was no objection on the part of the service to depôt battalions for regiments abroad, but the objection felt was to depôts for regiments at home, as it was considered that for the latter the proper depôts for teaching the young soldiers were the regiments themselves.
COLONEL DICKSONhad been formerly opposed to depôt battalions, but experience had considerably modified his opinion, and he now thought that the system was the very best that could be adopted; but he wished, however, to draw attention to the fact that there seemed to be some discrepancy upon the Estimate in reference to the number of officers.
COLONEL DUNNEfelt confident that not a single officer of reputation in the service had ever praised these depôts as at present constituted. No doubt the discipline was as good as it could be under the circumstances, but men were taken away from their regiments, and when their commanding officers obtained them, they often had to unlearn much that they had learnt. He hoped sincerely the good sense of the Government would induce them to do away with a system which was so injurious to the British service. But he should be sorry to see the Committee pressed to a vote on a point of discipline of this kind.
§ COLONEL SYKESnoticed that the Vote for this item amounted in the present year to £41,337, while last year it was only £35,807, and the Committee had no means of judging in what branch the increase took place.
§ MR. CARNEGIEsaid, he should feel obliged if the Under Secretary for War would give them some idea how many of these depôt battalions were required for regiments at home, and how many for regiments abroad. He should certainly vote for a reduction on the depôt battalions for regiments at home.
MR. T. G. BARINGconcurred very much in what had fallen from the hon. and gallant Member for the Queen's County (Colonel Dunne) that a matter, which really related entirely to discipline, namely, whether recruits should be drilled separately or in their regiments, could hardly be discussed with the prospect of coming to a just conclusion in that House. The hon. and gallant Gentleman had stated that no officer of reputation approved the depôt system; but only last year a long discussion arose in "another place," on a Motion of the Earl of Lucan, in the course of which the Commander-in-Chief expressed himself most decidedly in favour of the present system, and distinctly stated that Sir George Wetherall was a warm advocate of it, and that Lieutenant General Love, Inspector General of Infantry, though he had held a different opinion at first, was in the end in favour of the system. It would, perhaps, be satisfactory for the Committee to know that a neighbouring nation, not supposed to be ignorant of the right way of training soldiers, had actually adopted a system of depôt battalions; and he had seen a letter from Prance stating that the reason of the change was that the depôt battalions in this country were considered very advan- 768 tageous, because under that system regiments were always fit for active service. With respect to depôts for regiments at home and regiments in the colonies, he must observe that depôts for regiments serving at home and those serving abroad were in the same battalion, with the exception of the depôts for Indian regiments.
§ MR. BROWN-WESTHEADread a letter from an officer at one of the depôts, testifying to the usefulness of these establishments in drilling officers and men.
§ SIR JOSEPH PAXTONasked whether if the Vote were carried it would be used with other regiments when the depôt battalions were done away with? If so, they would not be supporting economy but interfering with the discipline of the army.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, that if the proposal was affirmed he might have to ask for a supplementary Vote for the half-pay of the officers reduced.
MAJOR STUART KNOXsaid, that finding the House so little inclined to retrenchment, he would withdraw his Amendment.
§
Motion made, and Question,
That the item of £41,337, for the Staff of Depôt Battalions be omitted from the proposed Vote.
§ Put, and negatived.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ MR. CHILDERSmoved that the item of £11,157, for allowance to the Foot Guards, in lieu of Stock-Purse Fund for recruiting and other expenses, should he struck out, on the ground that it had been already voted under the head of Vote 2.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the item of £11,157, for the Allowance to the Foot Guards in lieu of Stock Purse Fund for Recruiting and Hospital Expenses, be omitted from the proposed Vote.
MR. T. G. BARINGexplained that the inference of the hon. Member was incorrect. There had been a Vote taken, but this item had not been voted. The hon. Gentleman referred to an explanatory paper which comprised items from Votes two and three.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSthen rose to propose the reduction of the Vote in the case of items previous to that which had just formed the subject of discussion.
§ MR. MASSEYinformed him that it was not competent for him to do so, inasmuch as he should have made his Motion with regard to those previous items before the hon. Member for Pontefract (Mr. 769 Childers) had risen to move the omission of a subsequent item.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he had risen at the same time with the hon. Member for Pontefract, and that he thought it was open to him to take the course which he was about to adopt.
§ COLONEL SYKESunderstood that the Committee had simply rejected the Motion for the omission of the Vote respecting depôt battalions, but that it was still open to any hon. Member to more the reduction of any of the items.
§ MR. MASSEYsaid, the last question decided by the Committee was that the sum of £41,337 should be voted for depôt battalions. It was, therefore, impossible to re-open the discussion upon that Vote. The question now before the Committee was that involved in the Amendment of the hon. Member for Pontefract.
§ MR. H. A. BRUCEsaid, they had been told that this item was explained in paper 10 on Vote No. 2. He was not satisfied with that explanation. They were now on Vote No. 3, and he could not understand how that was explained by any statement having reference to Vote No. 2. He must express his astonishment that the gentlemen of the Guards should wish to retain this Stock Purse, which he thought put them in an inviduous position as compared to other regiments.
§ MR. CHILDERShad no objection to withdraw his Amendment in the meantime, in order to allow the hon. Member for Lambeth to move the reduction of previous items.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, he objected to several items in the Vote. An increase of £9,000 had taken place in the charge for marching allowance and cost of conveyance of recruits and escorts, while the charge for hospital expenses, medicines, and treatment of the sick had been raised from £148,018 to £188,104. The item for the movement of troops at home had been increased by £37,000, and additions had been made to several other items, making a total increase as compared with last year of £90,748. He moved that the Vote should be reduced to that extent.
§ MR. MASSEYinformed the hon. Gentleman that he must move the reduction of a particular item. The hon. Membertor Pontefract had withdrawn his Amendment on the understanding that the hon.
§ Gentleman intended to call attention to an item in a previous part of the Vote.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSwithdrew his Motion, and proposed the reduction of the charge for marching allowance and cost of conveyance of recruits and escorts from £15,000 to £6,000.
COLONEL DUNNEagreed with the hon. Member that this item required explanation. If, as the Committee had been told, recruiting was to be stopped altogether, there was no reason why this charge should be increased by £9,000.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the reason of the increase was that the estimate of last year did not coincide with the expenditure. He had never stated that recruiting was to be stopped altogether for a whole year. He had merely said that recruiting for the depôts of regiments serving in India had been stopped.
COLONEL DUNNEDid the hon. Gentleman propose to pay this year the amount that had been overspent last year?
COLONEL NORTHwished to ask whether the order had not gone out to stop recruiting. He knew the fact to be so.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the item last year had been framed without sufficient reference to the expenditure; while the present Estimate had been framed with reference to the actual expenditure of last year; recruiting could not be stopped altogether. The Limited Service Act would begin to operate in the course of the year upon the Cavalry and Artillery.
§ SIR FREDERIC SMITHsupposed that the cost of marching was pretty much the same every year. It was difficult to understand, therefore, why a Vote which was £6,000 last year should this year reach £15,000. Would the hon. Gentleman tell the House that the real expenditure under this item was £15,000 last year?
§ COLONEL STUARTThen how was it paid?
§ COLONEL SYKESsaid, that on account of the reduction of the Indian army a surplus number of 19,000 men would require to be absorbed in the regiments there. The recruiting establishments in England would not, therefore, be subject to the same charges as last year.
§ MR. CHILDERSperceived that the levy money was £40,000; did the hon. Under Secretary mean that 40,000 men were to be raised this year?
§ SIR HENRY WILLOUGHBYsaid, he found that in 1859 the expenses of recruiting were £4,000; the next year they were £6,000; and now they were £15,000. In 1858 he found that the aggregate increase of actual expenditure over the sums voted for particular purposes was £212,000. It was perfectly absurd to vote amounts for purposes to which, in fact, they were never applied. It was only now that the House knew to what purposes the sums voted in 1858 were actually applied; and in the same way they were now voting sums in perfect ignorance of what would be their application. It was simply a waste of time. He wished the hon. Gentleman the Under Secretary of the War Department would explain the cause of the increase from £4,000 to £15,000.
MR. DANBY SEYMOURmust insist on some explanation respecting this £40,000, which would provide for the bounty of one-third of the army.
§ MR. W. WILLIAMSsaid, the fact was that the Government had the power of altering the application of any Vote they pleased without the sanction of the Treasury. He thought that a note ought to be appended to the Estimates each year, stating what amounts were required to supply deficiencies in former Votes, and what amounts were to be applied to present or future purposes.
§ VISCOUNT PALMERSTONsaid, that no part of the Vote would go to supply the deficiency of last year. There were certain charges that could be calculated with tolerable precision, such as the number of men, the pay, the clothing, &c.; but there were others that could only be conjecturally estimated, such as the movement of troops, the number of recruits, and the charge of moving them from the depôts to their regiments. The best ground for these calculations was the actual expenditure of the preceding year. Last year it was found that the Vote fell short of what was requisite, and it was, therefore, increased this year.
§ MR. MONSELLreminded the House that no recruits would be needed for this year, and therefore the smallest sum ever voted would be sufficient for this year. Now the year before last the charge for recruiting was only £4,000, yet here they 772 were with a charge of £15,000 for a year when there was to be no recruiting.
MR. HENLEYsaid, the expense of moving recruits must depend to some extent on the number of recruits raised. There was a great demand for recruits last year, and the expense went up 50 per cent. This year it had jumped up 150 per cent. What it would be next year no one could tell. But that was not all—there was to be less recruiting this year, and it was un-satifactory to find that the expense for recruiting was increasing.
§ MR. H. A. BRUCEthought his hon. Friend the Under Secretary had received little encouragement for his having for the first time offered a fair and candid statement of recruiting expenses. It appeared that 20,000 recruits were to be raised, and it did not appear to him that £15,000 was an extravagant sum for conveying them to their depôts.
LORD BURGHLEYcalled attention to the expense incurred (£500) in sending recruits up to London to be attested, where they might be rejected, and then they had to be sent back to their homes.
MR. T. G. BARINGexplained that owing to the number of ten years' service men who were already taking their discharge, and the number of twelve years' men who would this year begin to do so, a greater amount of recruiting would be necessary than at first sight appeared.
GENERAL PEELsupported the Vote. In the year 1858, the Estimate was £5,000, but the actual expenditure was £15,000.
§
Motion made, and Question,
That the item of £15,000, for Marching Allowance, and Cost of Conveyance of Recruits, Escorts, &c., be reduced by the sum of £9,000.
§ Put, and negatived.
§ Original Question again proposed:—
COLONEL DUNNEcomplained of the number of horses that was proposed to be bought; 2,000 were to be purchased this year, and 20,000 were purchased last year. He wanted to know what had been done with them.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the number proposed to be purchased was actually necessary, and the Estimate had been framed from the Returns of strength as compared with establishments.
§ SIR FREDERIC SMITHobjected to the Vote for the conveyance of troops, which was increased by the amount of £37,000 over that of last year, and moved that it be reduced by that sum.
§
Motion made, and Question proposed,
That the item of £110,000, for Movement of Troops at Home, be reduced by the sum of £37,000.
MR. T. G. BARINGsaid, the item had been increased, principally in consequence of the establishment at Hythe and the inspection of Volunteer movements by officers of the army.
§ Motion, by leave, withdrawn.
§ Original Question put, and agreed to.
§ House resumed.
§ Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.
§ Committee to sit again this day.